Bottom of the Dark
by So Said the Gramophone
Summary: You and I, we are at a place light does not exist... Survival is purely philosophical.


Usual disclaimers apply.

* * *

**Bottom of the Dark**

"Think you regret it?"

That could have been an innocent question. Maybe it was, but considering it was Rude? He doubted it, in a way. Rude was a lot of things. A surprisingly good friend, a partner, drinking buddy, but not _innocent_. Well, not completely anyways. Reno wouldn't say that he wasn't the easier going of the two of them, appearances aside. So he glanced at him, side long, mouth around the filter of a half-crooked cigarette, though it wasn't lit. He didn't need a fist to the face again for smoking indoors. Technically, he wasn't even supposed to have it.

What could he say? He had an oral fixation.

The sort that showed up in all kinds of ways.

Rude wasn't looking back. Rather, he was looking out the window of the fiftieth floor, the sort that spanned full-length. Floor to ceiling. Pristine. Not a single flaw. Clean enough that they could see their reflections in it; Rude's tall bulk with his arms at his sides, and Reno's lank, barely above shoulder height compared. Rude was watching him through the glass. Even with his sunglasses.

"Regret what? Don't tell me you're getting cold feet. Never did before," Reno drawls, lazy and exasperated as his green eyes flicker to focus _past _the ugly mockery of reflections and contradictions, out over Midgar and the missing Sector Seven Plate.

Rude shook his head. "No."

But what he isn't saying is _There isn't anything to get nervous about_. Not that Reno would admit to it, even as his hands dug into his pockets to fight off the air-conditioned chill that poor circulation wasn't too good at fighting off, mouth taking a distinctly sour aftertaste that had nothing to do with nicotine. "...soooo...?" It falls off his thin lips, haphazard, just like his rumpled appearance.

"So," Rude says with that sort of finality of his, and his chest rises and falls in a breath he doesn't express, "Think you regret it?"

Reno tossed it around in his mind. Mulled it over for all of a split second, just until his grin, sickle-bright and knife-sharp, _crushing_, hit his face. Twisting up a little more smoothly than he thought it ever could. "Nah. Not much we can do about it. Maybe later."

"What if there's no 'later'?"

"Sheesh! So full of questions! What's gotten _into ya_, baldy?"

Rude mouth twists. Just a fraction, the way his brows tend to, in that dark reflection, and Reno gives him a laugh while his slender, stick-thin frame settled to lean where there was a break in the thick glass, metal support, structure and sculpted, just like everything else. But he doesn't answer. He didn't have to, Reno was sure of it. It wasn't like he didn't know the answer, anyways. It was that woman. Eh, Reno couldn't say he disagreed- legs that went on and _on_, great rack, could throw one hell of a punch... What wasn't there to like? So Reno snorted, tossing the cigarette with little care over his shoulder, decidedly done with it anyways.

But his grin didn't waver. "What a pain, you know. You're thinking too much, partner. People like us? It's only second nature to want the things we know we can't have. Makes it easier. But we're not like them."

Reno's palm came to the glass, cold it felt, but from what? Eh, he didn't care. Rude was listening, like he always did. That was what mattered.

"If we go regretting every little thing, we're going to drown, right? That's what they say. See that city out there?" A pause, just for Rude to tilt his head, watching him watch the city. "We're born in it, we'll die in it. So what's the difference in our method of survival compared to everyone else's?"

This time? Rude snorted. Snorted and gave it up. "Mouthy," he grunted. But whatever else, this time, was one his mind, Reno couldn't tell for once. He was closed off. He didn't need to read it, at least. "You would say something that depressing."

"Hey, someone's gotta cheer your ass up? You go moping again, I'll start writing poetry. And we _both_ know how that'll go."

It was an easy reminder.

They had their own, when everything hit rock bottom. They had their own, they'd always have their own when nothing else could be counted on. Not the city, Reno had decided, not Shinra. Nothing else. _They_ needed the Turks.

Not the other way around.

An annoyed exhale, and the redhead was leaning away from the windows, thumping Rude across the chest with the back of his hand. "C'mon. I'm starving. Let's get the hell out of here." And then he was gone. Moving down the hall to the elevator.

Rude spared the window, the city, their reflections, and Reno's retreating back for all of a moment. Trying to decide if he really knew what Reno was talking about, or if he didn't because Reno himself didn't. Maybe it didn't matter after all. He shrugged, mostly to himself. "Yeah. Fine. Let's go."

The only thing left in that hallway were just words left unsaid.


End file.
